Warped resin

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chumpo
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Warped resin

#1

Post by chumpo » 19 May 2014, 05:58

I've had this kit for several years . It's a Best Panzer IV A . It's a thick resin hull on a Trista Panzer IV D chassis . it came severely warped and I just hid away . Finally got brave enough the other day to boil a big pot of water and attempted to straighten out the misshaped hull . It took five attempts which consisted of boiling a pot of water soaking the resin hull for about three or four minutes then setting the hull with a lot of weight on it on a flat surface to cool down completely . each time took a little bit of the warp age away . kind of scary , I was thinking I would mess it up . But in all I think it turned real nice .
Attachments
panzer iv a 053.jpg save.jpg
panzer iv a 052.jpg save.jpg
panzer iv a 050.jpg save.jpg
panzer iv a 049.jpgsave.jpg
panzer iv a 048.jpg save.jpg

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KHeitmann
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Re: Warped resin

#2

Post by KHeitmann » 19 May 2014, 09:10

Good work. It would have been interesting to see the original warped hull before you started working on it, unless I'm missing something in the series of images above.
If your sword is too short, take one step forward. - Japanese proverb


chumpo
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Re: Warped resin

#3

Post by chumpo » 20 May 2014, 00:50

I did not figure to take the before pictures , the left rear and the right front was raised and would not lie down flat . I really figured I would destroy it before it would be fixed . That's how frustrated I was . I was worried that it would distort with the boiling water , but I guess I was wrong . It was after the fact that it fitted perfectly that I took the pictures . So for now I'll just add the pictures as it gets assembled . How does it look so far ?

chumpo
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Re: Warped resin

#4

Post by chumpo » 20 May 2014, 01:29

The front piece , the plate right in front of the machine gun and drivers vision port was distorted , its the gray colored piece of plastic . I took that out of dragon 6264 . It was one of the wrong pieces and was going to be just thrown away . It was kind of bare , lacked the details of the recessed screw heads . finally came up with this idea of taking the unused tristar part from the upper hull and thinning it down until it was paper thin . this was very difficult so hard to hold , I finally came up with the idea to glue it upside down on a piece of glass then used a xacto knife to scrape it thin . There was just no way to sand it down .
Question on this plate , is there a weld seam right above the access panels and right below machine gun and drivers vision port ?
Attachments
panzer iv 001.jpg saved.jpg
after shaving the piece paper thin I think it looks way better .
panzer iv a 049.jpgsave.jpg
the gray colored plastic was devoid of any detail , way bare .

chumpo
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Re: Warped resin

#5

Post by chumpo » 20 May 2014, 04:12

How would you guys go about duplicating those recessed screw heads ? I had tried drilling a hole on to plastic stock , then take a rod and slot the top and push it down the hole . Then cut and cement from the backside . But that was driving me crazy and cross eyed .

Steve Hutchinson
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Re: Warped resin

#6

Post by Steve Hutchinson » 20 May 2014, 07:16

Hi Chumpo,

Use the Aber PE screw heads set 35 A101, there are 11 screw heads, evenly spaced across the front of the grey piece,
6 in front of the straight piece in front of the drivers plate, and a joint line at the 1st bend to the left of the drivers plate.
the other side with the bend and machine gun has 5 screw heads with just one on the short side.
I have tried to photo my Dragon IV A but in black primer with my cheap camera you just can't see them.
I also have the back plate that the inner gun mantle sits in, if that helps to carve off the resin mantle, so it will move.
Anything else just let me know.
Regards
Steve H

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KHeitmann
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Re: Warped resin

#7

Post by KHeitmann » 20 May 2014, 07:29

It's looking good so far. :)

You may want to experiment with the recessed screws on some scrap plastic or styrene. I didn't have any suggestions myself so I Googled it and came up with a printout of page from the Osprey Publishing book Panzer Modelling. There some excellent ideas in this material on how to super-detail a model, including "recessed bolts". Look on the book page 27 in the left column.

Of course, you can always get this book from Amazon or Osprey Publishing for future reference.
If your sword is too short, take one step forward. - Japanese proverb

chumpo
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Re: Warped resin

#8

Post by chumpo » 20 May 2014, 17:41

Did you just sign up Steve ?

chumpo
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Re: Warped resin

#9

Post by chumpo » 20 May 2014, 23:09

Bolts and nuts are no problems , it's the recessed one that makes me scratch my head .

chumpo
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Re: Warped resin

#10

Post by chumpo » 24 May 2014, 07:21

Been putting along , suspension done . less dampers . The main gun was static , the resin and mantled was in one piece so I cut it out and will make it work .
Attachments
panzer iv 002.jpg save.jpg
it was a real pain scribing out the mantled with an xacto knife
panzer iv 001.jpg save.jpg
panzer iv minus a couple of dampers .

chumpo
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Re: Warped resin

#11

Post by chumpo » 25 May 2014, 00:59

so far
Attachments
005.jpg save.jpg
The resin was uneven at the to of the mantlet , I tried testors contour putty , when that did not work tried Tamiya and squadron putty then all the others ,they all did no good . Then I tried some milliput , that seems to work , will wait overnight then sand it down .
003.jpg save.jpg
Here's how it looks from the front . Did not get the elevation travel I was hoping for but it is functional now .
002.jpg save.jpg
The kit parts married to the resin pieces , it get difficult holding them to sand .
001.jpg save.jpg
Last edited by chumpo on 25 May 2014, 06:05, edited 2 times in total.

egonzinc
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Location: Puerto Rico

Re: Warped resin

#12

Post by egonzinc » 25 May 2014, 01:49

Looks like the operation was very successful. Interesting model of a super early PzIV ausf A!

chumpo
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Re: Warped resin

#13

Post by chumpo » 25 May 2014, 02:24

At a minimum it gave the mantlet a sense of dept . Just could not get the elevation travel I was hoping for but it's not static anymore .

chumpo
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Posts: 60
Joined: 08 Oct 2010, 13:45

Re: Warped resin

#14

Post by chumpo » 26 May 2014, 01:45

Could not get anything to bond with the resin , they all would not hold . Finally cut thin strips of styrene plastic and superglued it to the edges , that held and was able to be shaped to a nice 90 degree edges .

chumpo
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Joined: 08 Oct 2010, 13:45

Re: Warped resin

#15

Post by chumpo » 27 May 2014, 08:06

Here's the mantle so far . I have a question on the gun , the piece that extends out with the gun . The one with the eight screws , four abreast . This is off a panzer iv d , now on the iv a how many screws or were they all the same for the short barreled 75 mm ?
Attachments
panzer iv 001.jpg save.jpg
everything fitted , seems to fall in plce
panzer iv 002.jpg save.jpg
look a lot better than the one piece casting
panzer iv 003.jpg save.jpg
just a lot of sanding and carving .

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